


Pieces of Silver and Gold

by blueangel



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Prostitution
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-11-23
Updated: 2012-11-24
Packaged: 2017-11-19 08:41:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/571359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueangel/pseuds/blueangel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>‘’ Don’t,’’ She said softly and removed the gold veil that had covered her face from Dorne to Kingslanding. Crushing the silk in her hands she placed it on her brothers body; running her finger along the length of her scar, ‘’ I have no need for your pity.’’</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

When Myrcella was young; old enough to realize her place in this world, but young enough not to except it, she had dreamed of a golden world filled with sunlight and happiness, a world of clear waters and hope. A world of knights and princes; where they were chivalrous and kind- a far cry from the world she knew. Her world was a world of crimson that held little gold, and where an act of kindness was only a mask for a threat.  Even then she knew the bleakness of the land she was born into.

Then she had been sent away to Dorne where everything was golden, but, there was always that looming threat she could see in the people of Dorne’s eyes; a warning that she was not one of them.

Still, she delighted in seeing the sea and playing Cyvasse with Trystane- could almost fool herself in thinking that she was happy- was safe- with him. A girl’s foolish dream whose abrupt reality came down on her with a swing of a sword.  Now she truly knew this world as it was. A world where beauty marred was beauty no longer, and to have a bastards name was to know scorn and ridicule; to know that you were judged on the actions of those that came before you.  

While Myrcella could not boast of surviving the Others, for she was too far south to be touched by winter, she could say that even after the Wall fell and Danearys Stormborn took her place on the iron throne- she held her head high. When everyone else, even Trystane, had abandoned her- she had remembered that she was a Lannister of Casterly Rock.

Even now when she stands before a throne her brothers had once occupied- where now sits a woman with three dragons at her back, Myrcella does not show her fear. She can’t. Myrcella bows and the courtesies she learned as a young girl pour from her mouth, knowing that these words may be her last. She expects to meet her end at the hands of dragon fire or a Dothraki arakh, but instead the queen ushers her up and into her private solar.  

This woman who had taken everything from her- her family, her home- now looked her with empathy; as if this kin slayer knew what it was like to be alone in the world.

‘’ You must understand,’’ the dragon queen says,’’ that you were only spared because of my Lord Hand’s affection for you, and that you shall not be shown the same clemency if you should show yourself in Kingslanding again.’’

‘’ I am to be banished.’’ It is not a question, but Myrcella had never considered any other option than death and the weight of those words seem to bear down on her.

‘’ To any of the cities of your choosing, of course.’’ Myrcella holds back a sharp retort and remembers the name she carries, the blood that runs through her veins, no matter how tainted, and composes herself.

‘’ You are most gracious, you majesty.’’ She says finally.

Danearys Targaeryn regards her with veiled eyes, ‘’ you brother rests in the great Sept of Baelor, if you so wish I shall have an escort take you there.’’ At the mention of her brother Myrcella’s throat begins to tighten and her hands tremble.

‘’ Thank you, your majesty.’’ Daenerys dismisses her with a wave of her hand, and for a moment Myrcella’s cheeks heat. It is a reminder that she is no longer a princess, but a _bastard_ who is given a bastards courtesy.

Xxx

True to her word Myrcella is escorted to the Sept that afternoon. She stares straight ahead as the people whisper and point at her passing. Do they pity her, she wonders? Do they sympathize with the bastard princess, the king slayers daughter, the Lannister whores spawn? Would they have cheered at her death given the chance- these peasants who knew nothing of the game and whose allegiance changed with the direction of the wind.

In the end Myrcella pushes her way through the crowd and into the Sept of Baelor. It’s quiet, the sept, and peaceful, as if the outside world did not exist- that world of fire, blood, and chaos. She shrugs off her guards and makes her way to her brother.

Her beautiful, perfect, innocent brother; who’s only failing was his naivety. Myrcella touched the golden shroud that covered her brothers body, and for a moment she was tempted to pull it back and see what her brother had become, but that temptation quickly passed and the need to keep Tommen as he was; chubby cheeked and smiling overtook her. Instead, Myrcella laid her head upon the golden shroud and watched as the tears she had long held within her dropped onto the shroud.

‘’Tommen.’’ Her voice cracked and her hands fisted the golden material, kneeling before her brother’s body, wanting to tear it to bits- wanting to bring her mother back from the dead so that she may answer for her crimes.

‘’ Myrcella.’’ A hand touched her shoulder as she whirled around to see her uncle Tyrion before her, a man who she had once delighted in seeing, now made her sick.

‘’ You have no right to be here uncle.’’ Myrcella stood up and righted the shroud before turning to her uncle again.  

Tyrion looked at her with pity in his eyes and reached out for her with a stumped hand which she promptly slapped away, ‘’ you must understand the position I was in-‘’

‘’ I understand perfectly uncle,’’ Myrcella said, and then with a little chuckle added, ‘’ our words were never family, duty, honor were they? No, always Hear me roar, that’s what mother always told me. Tell me uncle, did they roar? Mother and uncle, did they scream when they were burned alive?’’ Fury dripped from her voice and her uncle looked as if he had been struck.

‘’ Myrcella-‘’ he said softly.

‘’ Don’t,’’ She said softly and removed the gold veil that had covered her face from Dorne to Kingslanding. Crushing the silk in her hands she placed it on her brothers body; running her finger along the length of her scar, ‘’ I have no need for your pity.’’

‘’ You shall be well looked after, I promise you.’’ Tyrion touched her hand before stepping back again as her body turned rigid.

‘’ Oh uncle,’’ she said turning her face to the ceiling where sunlight filtered through- warming her- and she could not help but think that Tommen would like being laid before the sun, where he could bask in it; her brother was never one for winter. He was a summer child, ‘’ you did always tell the most fantastic tales.’’  

Xxxx

Myrcella settles in Norvos because she remembers Trystane telling her of his mother- a woman with dark hair and smoky eyes, who’s image he had said that he was forgetting more about everyday, but from what he told her it was a city of hills; green as far as the eye could see. He said it was peaceful.

Myrcella needed peace.

Tyrion had given her a sack of gold dragons as she had boarded the ship and as she crossed the sea she entertained the idea of throwing them out just for the sake of it- just to spite him. Then she remembers that she shall be on her own here and she clutches them to her chest.  

Xxxx

Norvos is a city of green hills and small villages; where traders try to sell her trinkets of jade and quartz, and the stalls smell of rosemary and black pepper. The city is a place of wealth much like Dorne and she enjoys the familiarity of it all, and she thinks of settling there for a time before she decides that no, she would rather settle in one of the lower villages.

So she settles in an empty white hut- for it is small with nothing but a chair and a table with a dirt floor and a cooking fire. With it, it is all she has besides the clothes on her back and the sack of golden dragons which weighs heavily in her pack. She is tempted to turn back for a moment and go back to the city where she could live comfortably, but then she imagines the dragon’s being handed one by one to strangers until she was left with nothing. Because luxury cannot last forever on a sack of dragons and she is too proud to ever write to her uncle and ask for more.

So she buries the sack in the ground next to a pear tree that grows behind her hut, a gnarled and overgrown thing with fruit that is over ripe and rotten, but it is also hers she supposes.

Xxx

Myrcella works as a seamstress. Taking in every scrap of clothing she can. Myrcella pricks her fingers day after day; all the while the few dragons that remain are buried beneath the rotten pears. Every day when it seems like her shoulders shall break from the weight of the buckets she carries from the well, when her fingers bleed enough to lay a stain on her own clothes, and when her eyes feel heavy enough that she falls asleep on her floor of rushes and dirt, she feels like presence of the glittering gold in the back of her mind. But then she remembers why she had gotten the gold and she picks herself up and prepares for another day.

It is not all bad, she supposes. There is her neighbor, a woman called Nita with whom she sews with and who taught her to cook and clean- and asked no questions about her past besides her name. Nita is beautiful with her sun kissed skin and grey eyes, and in a way she reminds Myrcella of Arianne; in the way that she can trick a fruit seller into giving her half price on his fruits with just a smile, and she seems to have the butcher wrapped around her finger. But Nita is kinder. She has a mother’s heart, her septa would have said. While Myrcella is cautious around the village children that seem to be forever under her feet, for they reminder too much of Tommen, Nita hands them sweets and splashes with them in the river.

‘’ You are so kind to them.’’ Myrcella tells her one night before the fire. Nita had smiled then, a sad smile, and told Myrcella that she had, had a child once. A beautiful delicate thing called Alma that had clung to this world for only a day before passing.

‘’ And your husband?’’ Myrcella had asked in a quiet voice. Nita’s face had emptied at that and she had whispered of a gentle man, a sailor, who had passed from a fever not a few years past. In a sudden act Myrcella had gathered the elder woman in her arms and hugged her tight. It was the first time she had touched another person with such affection in such a very long time that for a moment she was taken aback when Nita wrapped her arms around her in return.

When they had pulled apart Myrcella had wiped the tears off sun kissed cheeks, and then she had told the woman of a boy who had hair that had been kissed by the sun. A boy who had loved kittens and iced milk, and who had worn a crown that was far too big for him. And then she told her of a little girl who had met her end at the end of a sword. When she was done Myrcella had rested her head on Nita’s lap while she cried.

‘’ I believe that girl still lives.’’ Nita cupped Myrcella’s cheeks, taking no notice of the scar, and smiled with a brilliance that made Myrcella’s lip tremble.

‘’ No,’’ Myrcella’s voice shook as she wiped the tears off her cheeks, ‘’ she’s dead.’’

Xxxx

Myrcella watches as the bearded priests take a screaming boy and put him in the wagon with the others. Some of them are not even eight years of age, and all of them tremble in fright from the man with axes that are branded on his chest- the man who takes them away from their homes. She looks back at the mother of the boy who had just been lifted into the wagon. The woman who she had just passed in the street the other day, her son hanging on her hip, now cries silently as her husband stands in front of her. Her son cries out to her; paying the father no attention and Myrcella turns her back when in a last act of desperation the woman had rushed to the boy.

 Behind her she hears the cries of mother and son together. She goes into her hut once she hears the pleading and shuts the door behind her.

Xxxx

Even from this small village the bells can be clearly heard and when they ring at night it makes something in her panic; her heart beating faster and her palms sweat, even in the cool night air.   

 _‘’ If the bells ever ring when the moon is still up you go with ser Arys.’’_ Her mother had told her.

Now when she wakes to the ringing she is alone in the dark. There is no ser Arys to protect her and she has no mother to soothe her.

She is alone.

Xxxx

Nita drags her along- weaving in and out of the crowd, only stopping to look at the men and women who dance with fire in their hands before they make their way to the Sinner’s Steps.

Even in the stifling heat people seem to crowd around the mosaic steps. Children giggle and babes cry as the bears, big and black with chains that wrap around their necks, dance their way down the colorful steps.

 _‘Clang, clang, clang’_ , the bells ring, and at the sound the bears begin to stand and whirl around each other. Nita looks from the bears to her as Myrcella watches with a small smile on her face. Together the two of them clap as the crowd mimics the sound around them.

‘’ Isn’t it wonderful?’’ Nita asks. Myrcella nods and breathes deeply as she remembers that the ringing of these bells mean nothing.

There are no weddings, no deaths, and a siege is not on the horizon. This is a celebration. She lets men with colored beards dance with her in the streets in a fury of complicated steps and drums; lets herself laugh as she drinks sweet wine and licks her fingers trying to get rid of the sticky mess that is candied violets.

But when it is all over and the bells are still ringing she remembers the chains that had clung to the animals necks and how they had seemed to roar in defiance.  

Xxxx

When men from Westeros pass through brandishing their swords; with armor catching the sunlight, she has to remind herself that she is no one here; she is a nameless foreigner who stumbles through their language and keeps to herself. She has to remind herself that she is not a bastard here and that she can walk through the market without being pointed at. When these men, with their Targaeryn banner flying above them, look at her; without _looking_ at her, she smiles smugly.

She is no longer defined by who her parents were or weren’t, or her uncle. Myrcella is no longer a piece in a game. It makes something in her heart soar and it makes her almost giddy.  

_She’s free._

 Xxxx

Sometimes it is so easy to forget who she is, who she _was,_ but then she will catch her reflection in the river and remember the woman who had been her mother.

Her mother had been beautiful and fierce, or that was how she had seemed when Myrcella had been young, but then as she had grown and she had started to see break and fray- a shadow of the young woman she had been. Or maybe something in her was always broken. How else could she-

Myrcella doesn’t like to think about- where she had come from, but in the end her own refection reminded her of it.

_‘’ You are so beautiful.’’ Her mother looked at her in the mirror and Myrcella gave her mother an innocent smile._

_‘’ Like you.’’ Mother gripped her shoulder and gave her a tight smile._

Inevitable Myrcella also thinks of her _uncle_ Jamie- a distant figure in her memory at best, but she thinks that if she were to cut her hair she might just look like him.

The thought makes her sick to her stomach.

Xxxx

The bells ring one after the other and out of habit Myrcella covers her head with a pillow and burrows into the blankets.

_‘Clang’_

 A knock at her door.

_‘Clang’_

Another knock.

‘’Myrcella!’’ She makes a frustrated noise and climbs out of her bed; the chill hitting her skin.

She opens the door and sees Nita looking harried; a shawl and dress hastily put on. Fear gnaws at Myrcella as the usually calm woman regards her with alarm.

‘’ What’s wrong?’’

‘’ Fire has spread to one of the other villages. They say it’s spreading.’’ Myrcella freezes for a moment before looking back inside her house.

‘’ But-‘’ Nita touches her shoulder for a moment and looks at her with empathy.

‘’ I know.’’ Myrcella rushes back in her house and puts on a dress and grabs what little belongings she’s collected in the past year. It’s not much; an extra dress, a sewing needle and thread, and a little rag doll that one of the children had given her. She wrapped them all in her blankets and ties a knot before going out into the back. The pear tree sat there still gnarled and ugly, and Myrcella remembered when she had told Nita that she was going to make that tree beautiful again. It’s too late now.

She digs her hands into the soil, aware of the glow of flames in the distance, until she finally pulls out the sack of dragons.

When she finally makes it back, Nita is still there waiting for her and Myrcella is never more grateful for a friend.

‘’ Come on.’’ They both run smoke and fire to their backs, and meet with the rest of the village just beyond the river.  

Three days and nights they wait.

For three days and nights the children cry from hunger and no one sleeps and the bells continue to ring.

They don’t know how the fire happened, but when it ends and they all go back and it is nothing but ashes.

People pick up the rumble as if somehow they would find all their belongings intact. Myrcella just walks where her little hut was, and looks at the empty space that now occupies it and weeps. Because that little gut was hers and it just started to feel like _home_. She feels the weight of the dragons in her hands and then back at the rest of the families that had been here for years. She knew more than anyone what it was like to lose everything.

So she goes from family to family and hands them a dragon. Her mother would have said that these peasants didn’t deserve it- to keep it all of it for herself. But she is not her mother and so the sack gets lighter and lighter until there is only one dragon left.

She gives it to Nita.

The woman protests but carefully Myrcella lays it in the older woman’s palm. ‘’ You showed me such kindness; something I have not had a lot of. Let me show you some.’’ Nita looks at the coin for a moment before hugging her.

‘’You are a good woman, Myrcella.’’ Myrcella nods and does not contradict her, although she would like to. When she peaks into the bag again there is a few silver stags left, and although she knows that the people in the village would be more than happy to help her start over she thinks that  perhaps the fire was a sign from the gods. Her time here is done.

Xxxx

Nita is sad to see her go, but Myrcella reassures that all will be well and that it that.

Once Myrcella is far enough away she sells the horse she had ridden to Norvos, an animal that is too worn to walk anymore and so she gives him to a butcher and it is enough to pay a trader to take a seat in his wagon. She is not stupid, or some naïve young maiden, and sees the look in the older man’s eyes when he thinks she isn’t watching. It is enough for her to filch a small knife from him and press it into his neck when he tries to touch her one night when he thinks she is sleeping.

He squirms as she presses the knife down onto his skin; drawing blood, and finally he whimpers and begs that he won’t do it again. It makes her feel triumphant to see him beg her for mercy; this little grubby man who thinks her too weak or too desperate to fight back.

The man stays away from her after that, even if he scowls at her sometimes, and they arrive in Myr without another incident. Myrcella doesn’t thank him, but instead walks away without turning back- disappearing into the crowd.

Myrcella had hoped to get work as a seamstress again, but the weavers and the sellers turn their noses up at her and she is reminded that she hasn’t taken a bath in weeks, and hasn’t bathed in anything other than a river in almost a year.  

Xxxx

So she goes to a public bath and strips down, her modesty long forgotten when a number of men had caught her bathing in the river. The warm water seems like such a luxury now more than ever as she enfolds herself in the warm water. Myrcella forgets those around her and lets herself be at ease for only a moment. When she comes back to herself she hears the laughter or children and the chatter of women, and she smiles.

She puts on her dress, the cloth sticking to her still wet body when she notices her money is gone. Myrcella looks around desperately willing it not to be true before she trudges back outside and sits on the steps crying. All her money gone- what little was left of it. She had no more food. All she had left were thread and needle. Myrcella spends the rest of the day wandering the streets like a beggar until she finally gives in and sells the thread and needle to an old woman who looks at her with pity. When she places the copper coins into her hands Myrcella feels like screaming out in frustration. She has no more tears left.

Xxxx

With those coins she eats a chunk of bread barely fit enough for a mouse and curls up in an alleyway where she sleeps for the night and dreams of silks and jewels; until she wakes in the morning to the harsh reality of a worn dress and hunger.

She had seen beggars and thieves aplenty in Kingslanding, and she had looked on in scorn at their tired and dirty faces before her Septa rushed her back into the safety of the keep.  Now she is one of them.

 


	2. Chapter 2

Myrcella does not how long she wanders the streets of Myr. She knows that her stomach aches from hunger and that every day she wishes that she weren’t so proud and had written her uncle, and on one very bad day she wishes she had not placed those dragons into the hands of the villagers.

When she is desperate enough she joins the women who frequent the alleys and who call men to their sides for a moment- the whores that belong to no brothel. At first she is frozen against the walls as the others couple around and then she beckons one man to her with a wave of her hand and prays that he doesn’t care about the scar.

He won’t, she knows.

She does not care that he is drunk and his breathe smells rotten, or that his hands are rough on her hips. She does not focus on that.

 Myrcella cries out in pain when the man enters her, and closes her eyes as he moves and grunts out his pleasure. She ignores the bile in her throat and the rough wall that scrapes her back; instead she grabs onto the shoulder of his tunic- rough and coarse as it is- and ignores the smell of sweat that seems to permeate from his skin.

 It is quick and when it is all over she pulls the tattered rags of her dress back on herself, and kneels on the cold alley stone; gathering up the coins that the man had thrown to the ground.

She is reminded of when she had brandished a knife at a man just like the one she had now sold herself to. In part she is sickened with herself and yet she is too hungry and perhaps too tired to care. On the end of that first night she is able to buy a crusty loaf of bread from the baker. She licks the crumbs from her fingers and wishes for more.

More food, more money- more of anything.

Her mother would be ashamed, she knows. Cersei had wrinkled her nose at the whores that Robert Baratheon had laid on his lap. Myrcella had found that funny in the first days of finding out her true parentage.

Her mother was no better than the ladies who had cooed and awed at the king.

She finds it funny now to, but perhaps for a different reason. With blood on her thighs and pain stinging through her body she knows that she is just like those women who she had looked away from in embarrassment; when she was no more than a little princess in pink silks.

Night after night she lets men touch her the way they want to. All the while she looks at the stars and names them in her head; Meraxes, the Sword of the Morning, the maiden, and the warrior- the names echo in her head just as Trystane taught her, and then she tells herself that it will end soon.

Every night she gathers coins which she keeps tied around her thigh, and every night she counts them; spending them only on tansy tea or a crust of bread.

Myrcella ignores the people that go out of their way to avoid her. Hypocrites the lot of them. And the women- she smiles at them for she knows that late at night their husbands, brothers, or sons, will come to her.

Xxxx

When she has enough coin she heads to the brothels of Myr. The head mistress of The Honey Pot, an establishment on the outer most edge of Myr where sailors are the most frequent costumers, cannot be more than a few years older than her, but she is shrewd and demands payment before Myrcella can finish entering the doorway.

‘’ I’m not here- I mean I want to work here.’’

The woman quirks her lip, ‘’ I know.’’ She holds out her hand and Myrcella hands every coin she has. After counting them she looks Myrcella over. ‘’ You’re pretty enough. Except for that,’’ she flicks her fingers to the scar and for a moment Myrcella fears that the woman would send her away. Then she says, ‘’ But that’s no matter.’’ She ushers her in, not even looking back to see if Myrcella is following her.

At once Myrcella is accosted with the sight of different women; dark skinned and light, hair as bright as a sunset and dark as a ravens wings- all scantily clad in silks who smell like rosewater and lavender; making Myrcella self conscious of the dirt and grime that coats her skin.

 The mistress signals two of them and Myrcella is suddenly dragged in the back room. The place is made of silk and velvet with feathered pillows and pitchers of wine at every corner, and although there is still the faintest trace of sweat still in the air, it is still better than an alleyway.

The two women and the mistress place her in a copper tub; ripping whatever was left of her clothes and throwing them on the floor. Out of habit Myrcella covers herself as the two women giggle and leave while the mistress appraises her.

‘’ Modesty-they’ll like that.’’ A moment later the two come back and pour water on her. It is ice cold and she shivers as they begin to scrub her from head to toe. All the while the mistress watches her with a mild fascination that made Myrcella uncomfortable, as if she is some new filly- a new breed ready to be broken in.

 The two women yank her from the tub and begin to tug on her hair; the knots stubbornly  refusing to undo themselves- even as a child it had been like that, and it had nearly drove  her maid mad trying to get them out in the mornings.

  Next they pour oil onto her body that reminds her of a bottle that she had found at Casterly Rock- her grandmothers, she remembers. She had spilled accidently spilled it, and her mother had stuck her. Afterwards her uncle Tyrion had smiled sadly and handed it to her; kissing her cheek and calling her a sweet girl. It was an accident, he had told her, and so she had kept it at the bottom of her trunks. Myrcella had left those Dorne, but sometimes she had taken it out and smelled it; afraid to put it on.

Rosemary she recalls, it smelled of Rosemary.

Afterwards they hand her a dress of pink silk that nearly slips off her body when she puts it on. When she looks at the mistress the woman nods, ‘’ better,’’ and leaves, leaving Myrcella with the other two that she guesses do speak the common tongue. Awkwardly she smiles and makes her way back up to the front where already, the women drag the men in the back by their tunics; a smile on their faces.

‘’ You better get to work.’’ Myrcella turns to see a woman; younger than she is with silvery-white skin and hair like fire, walk up to her- lavender gown moving like liquid over her curves.

‘’I-‘’ Myrcella looks back at the men who leer at her suddenly uncertain. They had always come to her.

‘’ If you don’t you’ll only even be more in debt.’’

‘’ Debt?’’ Myrcella echoes.

‘’ You don’t think the mistress took you out of charity, did you? This is a business. The clothes on your back, the food you eat, the wine you drink; all those are part of your debt.’’ The woman inclines her head and Myrcella is struck with a memory of another; Sansa Stark, or the lady of Winterfell as she was now called. Both of them had the same fiery colored hair, but where Sansa had seemed kind all those years ago- there is a hard edge to this woman. ‘’ And if you don’t pay her back, she’ll kick you back onto the streets.’’

‘’ Thanks for the warning.’’ Myrcella mumbles.

The woman shrugs, ‘’ I’m Mira.’’

‘’I’m-‘’ She almost says Myrcella, but that seems wrong. She is no longer a princess, or a bastard. She is something entirely different.

 ‘’ I’m Jeyne.’’ A common enough name, but it was a new one.

Xxxx

Myrcella sleeps on a soft mattress now, and sleeps until its high noon. She eats fruits of all colors and sweet meats, and wears silks of different shades of pink because the mistress it makes her look more pure. Every day she sits by the windows and reads whatever she can get her hands or she chats with Mira while the younger woman sews a new dress. The day is an illusion; a seeming paradise to an outsider.

But then the sunsets and the men wander in. Some of them so drunk they can barely stand and some sober. All of them have hunger in their eyes.

Truly it is some sort of competition for the women of the brothel. They all gather in a rainbow of silks and jewels, and try to entice every man back to their room- they try to get as much coin as they can just to free themselves of debt. Myrcella is no different.

In the beginning she was unsure; there were men that leered at her and grabbed at her, and she had remembered her mantra that it would all be over soon, until she spied a young man as unsure as herself. Myrcella had quietly walked over, ignoring all the other men around her, and with a gentle smile held out her hand. There was no seduction or pretty words spoken. There was just an invitation. The man, light haired with even lighter eyes, had blushed and followed her back to her room. He had touched her gently, with a hesitation that she had never known, and had spent long before she even had her dress off.

Myrcella had pressed a kiss on his cheek and he had placed a handful of coins into her hands before stumbling out of her room. It had been easy as that.

Where some of the women coaxed the more handsome of the men; Myrcella looked for the men who stood in the corners of the brothel; shy and uncertain. She found them to be gentler than the drunkards who sometimes hit the women they took to bed; men who had never touched a woman and who were overeager and who paid well afterward. As a result Myrcella rarely had to take tansy tea and instead saved her coin in an alabaster jar which she kept hidden beneath a stone in her floor- what was left of it anyways.

Mira had spoke true and at the end of every week the mistress demanded half of what she had made. Truthfully, she had hoped she would have paid off her debts in a few months, but they just seemed to be growing, and she had wondered if anyone had ever paid off their debts.

‘’ Of course.’’ Mira had told her.

‘’ Who?’’ Myrcella had demanded and Mira had laughed then before leaning down and whispering to her, as if it was some great secret.

‘’ The mistress of course.’’

Xxxx

The sunsets once more and Myrcella quietly walks around the room, ignoring the calls of other men, and walks over to a young man who is nursing a cup of wine. Like usual she holds out her hand to him in silent invitation, and with a little reluctance he takes her hand in his own. Myrcella weaves in and out all the while she feels his palm in her own.

She leads him to her room and with quick work begins to untie the laces of his tunic, expecting him to let her lead, when he holds her hands still. Brown eyes meet her own uncertainly as he asks,’’ Do you speak the common tongue?’’

Myrcella takes a step back cautiously before answering with a nod of her head and then a, ‘’ Yes I do.’’ The man runs a hand through his chestnut colored hair, his face flushed to the tips of his ears as he looks around the room.

He clears his throat, ‘’ I-the other lads dragged me here,’’ he gestures to her, ‘’ but I-I.’’ he flushes even more and looks at her with pleading eyes, and suddenly Myrcella understands.  

‘’Oh- _oh_.’’ Despite herself Myrcella giggles a bit before offering him a seat and some wine. He tentatively perches on one of the white satin pillows, and happily takes the wine she offers; drinking it in one long gulp.

She offers him more wine before she sits down next to him, as uncertain as he on how to proceed. It had never happened before and she had only met two others who were so _inclined_. Myrcella retains a giggle when she remembers catching Uncle Renly and Loras in a corner of the Red Keep, and the two of them promising her all the sweets she could eat if she would keep quiet about what she had seen.

Myrcella takes a sip of her wine; the red liquid tasting of blood oranges and oak, reminding her of Dorne. ‘’ So what is your name?’’

‘’ Arron.’’ He answers, ‘’ and yours?’’

‘’ Jeyne.’’

Arron looks at his glass of wine, ‘’ I’m sorry-I promise I’ll pay you-‘’ She waves her hand as if pushing the words away and relaxes further into the pillows- laying her head in a hand and reclining on her stomach.  

‘’ It’s quite alright. I confess I have not talked to a man in a long while.’’ She smiles and lays her glass of wine on the floor. ‘’ But tell me, if you favor men then why not go to one of the other pleasure houses? I am sure-‘’

‘’ I could never do that.’’ He sighs and lays his wine glass down before relaxing on the pillow; closing his eyes briefly as if he has not slept for a good long while, ‘’ I could never force someone to do that- to pretend like that.’’ Myrcella smiles.

‘’ Then is there someone who you favor?’’ She knows he could choose not to answer, but he does anyway- be it from wine or the need to tell someone she does not know.

‘’ There is.’’ He smiles a little and for a moment there is a pang of jealousy in her heart; to be able to love someone is a rare thing indeed, she thinks.

‘’ And does he favor you?’’

‘’ I do not know.’’ She pours more wine for him, which he now sips little of.

‘’ I hope he does- I’m sure he does.’’ Arron nods and she steers the conversation away from his love after that. She asks him where he is from and why he is here, and she is happy to discover that he grew up close to the Trident-sworn to house Tully, and squiring for some lord who was on a diplomatic mission from the queen. Myrcella nods and smiles throughout his tales, feeling oddly unattached to what was once her home.

‘’ And you, where are you from?’’ He asks her once he’s done.

‘’ I grew up in Kingslanding,’’ she tells him truthfully, ‘’ I was a bastard and I came to the free cities hoping to start a new life.’’ She shrugs and takes a sip of her wine, even though she feels like her throat is closing up. Myrcella takes a deep breath, ‘’ and that’s it.’’

He looks curiously at her before he smiles once more and they continue to chat.

At the end of the night he places a handful of silver stags in her palm, ‘’ for a pleasant evening, my lady.’’

She freezes for a moment and then brushes it off with a teasing tone saying, ‘’ I’m no lady.’’ He mirrors her and with a flourish he bows and kisses her hand.

‘’ Could of fooled me.’’

Xxxx

With a flourish the mistress sits her down at a desk and tells her, ‘’ your debt is paid.’’ Myrcella blinks once. Then twice.

‘’ Really?’’ The mistress rolls her eyes and hands her a piece of paper, and Myrcella looks over the numbers numbly.

‘’ You may choose to stay here if you wish, or you can search out other prospects.’’

‘’ Other prospects.’’ Myrcella parrots.

‘’ Yes,’’ she says drily, ‘’ if you would stop speaking like a raven.’’ Myrcella hands her back the paper in embarrassment. ‘’ You are obviously highly educated,’’ the mistress continues,’’ You could become something more than just a simple whore.’’

‘’ I could?’’ Myrcella looks at her hands- still worn and weathered from work and thinks of her scar.

‘’ You could go to Bravoss and find a courtesan to teach you all her tricks.’’ Uncharacteristically the mistress smiles at her gently, ‘’ you could have songs written about you.’’  The mistress ushers her out and Myrcella rushes back to her rooms and with a heady delight and takes out her alabaster jar and counts out her coins. She has just enough.

It makes her want to weep with joy because after all these months she can leave, and-

Well perhaps the mistress is right and she could learn to be a courtesan, just perhaps she could become rich and be able to sleep in featherbeds; she could become independent. The thought made her feel even more elated.

 

 


End file.
